University of Kansas Publications, Museum of Natural History
Editors: E. Raymond Hall, Chairman; H. H. Lane, Edward H. Taylor

Volume 1, No. 17, pp. 281-284
August 16, 1948

 

 

University of Kansas
Lawrence, Kansas

 

 

PRINTED BY
FERD VOILAND, JR., STATE PRINTER
TOPEKA, KANSAS
1948



22-3341

In the vertebrate paleontological collection at the University of Kansas Museum of Natural History there are many fragments of turtles that have been collected, generally in connection with the excavation or recovery of other fossils. The generic identification of this material is possible in many instances, and such identifications give new and important geological and distributional records for genera in existence today.

All catalogue numbers refer to the vertebrate paleontological collection in the University of Kansas Museum of Natural History.

Kinosternon sp. No. 7729 consists of fragments of marginals, costals, and plastronal elements collected from Edson Quarry, Sherman County, Kansas. The age is middle Pliocene (Hemphillian). No. 7679, consisting of a nuchal, and fragments of marginals, costals, and neurals is from Nye Sink, XI Ranch, Meade County, Kansas, and is of Pleistocene age.

Any fossil record of Kinosternon is a welcome find, and these two specimens give new data both as to age and distribution. However, it should be emphasized that these identifications are based on fragments, and are tentative.

Pseudemys sp. No. 5613, Sherman County; 6784, Seward County; and 4728, Meade County, are three of many fragments, mainly elements of the nuchal plate and plastron, that were collected from Edson Quarry, Sherman County, Kansas, and from middle and late Pliocene beds in Seward and Meade counties, Kansas, respectively. The species represented cannot be differentiated from species of Pseudemys living today. Species of Pseudemys are common also in most of the Pleistocene deposits of western Kansas.

Testudo sp. In general, two recognizable lines of the genus Testudo existed in western Kansas during early Pliocene to mid-Pleistocene time—a line of large testudinates with a carapace three to four feet long, and one line of smaller tortoises with a rugose carapace approximately six to nine inches in diameter. Hibbard's Testudo riggsi (Hibbard, 1944) is the best known of these smaller turtles.